I chose to not go out today, I could have gone to a free classical concert in the City or see The Ruckus at Jalopy tonight. Going on a shopping walk is not as much fun. I posted this video on Facebook and people found it amusing. Where others see a protective cover for wires, I see a practice balance beam. I’m 64 years old but I couldn’t resist walking along the top. I do it most times when I walk that way and have since they put it in. I turned it into a game, and I don’t care that people can see me. I have seen other adults do it too. What Peter Pan got wrong is that it isn’t beneath your dignity to climb a tree.
I play games as I go about my life from counting steps to making lists, to writing songs and planning blogs. That’s not the end of it; there are games we all play, role playing games. We acknowledge this in our speech, we lament gender roles, and conflicts between our roles of spouses, parents, and workers. We are always playing one role or another. Right now, my role is blogger. My role is breaking he fourth wall. The difference between LARPing and life is that the rules are clearer in LARPing (LARP = Live Action Role Playing). I don’t LARP and I’m not much of a gamer, but the world doesn’t care about my preferences, life is a LARP. If it’s all role playing than what is the real me? It’s like asking if an electron or photo is a particle or a wave, it depends on the experiment you perform. A quantum example you might know better is Schrödinger’s cat. It’s both alive and dead until you open the box. I’m a blogger, DJ, friend, brother, teacher, and pest all superimposed. How I show look depends on the situation I’m in and how and when you observe me.
I usually say that I’m writing about myself, because that’s what I know best but in this situation I’m confident it’s true of you and of everyone else. What I’m not confident of is if everyone knows it. I suspect that many know it of themselves but feel that others somehow are always being “themselves.” The irony is that they are being themselves, they are LARPers too. One of my roles is being the person that not only sees that it’s all role playing but doesn’t mind. The idea might challenge the ego of some, it feeds mine. That’s just speculation.
I’m not the first, second, third, or 100th person to think of this. I’m leaning on the work of a great writer that neglected to copyright his words so I can use them freely.
All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first, the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms.
Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’ eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon’s mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
Wise Madness 